Publications & Testimony

UPDATE (2015): There have been wide vari­a­tions among states in exempt­ing defen­dants with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty from the death penal­ty. Professor John Blume (l.) of Cornell Law School, along with three co-authors, ana­lyzed claims filed under the Supreme Court’s deci­sion in Atkins v. Virginia (2002) against exe­cut­ing defen­dants with intel­lec­tu­al dis­abil­i­ty (for­mer­ly,​“men­tal retar­da­tion”). Overall, from 2002 through 2013, only about 7.7%…

On December 19, the Bureau of Justice Statistics released its annu­al sta­tis­ti­cal report on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the United States, with infor­ma­tion for 2013. It not­ed a con­tin­u­ing decline in the death row pop­u­la­tion and the num­ber of exe­cu­tions. Highlights of the…

On December 18, the United Nations vot­ed to adopt a res­o­lu­tion call­ing for a glob­al mora­to­ri­um on the death penal­ty, with an eye toward abo­li­tion. A record high 117 coun­tries vot­ed in favor of the res­o­lu­tion. The United States was one of just 38 nations that opposed it, and 34 nations abstained. Two years ago, a sim­i­lar res­o­lu­tion passed with 111​“yes” votes. This year’s res­o­lu­tion also urged those coun­tries that still car­ry out exe­cu­tions not to…

The par­ents of James Holmes recent­ly explained that their son is severe­ly men­tal­ly ill and asked he be spared the death penal­ty. Holmes is accused of killing numer­ous peo­ple at a movie the­ater in Aurora, Colorado. Robert and Arlene Holmes said they were aware of the great harm their son caused, not­ing,​“We are always pray­ing for every­one in Aurora. We wish that July 20, 2012, nev­er hap­pened.” They also rec­og­nized the sen­ti­ments among some…

On December 16, 2014, a South Carolina judge vacat­ed the con­vic­tion of George Stinney, Jr., the youngest per­son exe­cut­ed in the U.S. in the last cen­tu­ry. Judge Carmen Mullen wrote:​“I can think of no greater injus­tice than the vio­la­tion of one’s Constitutional rights which has been proven to me…

Whether the death penal­ty will be sought in a mur­der may depend more on the bud­get of the coun­ty in which it is com­mit­ted than on the sever­i­ty of the crime, accord­ing to sev­er­al pros­e­cu­tors. A report by the Marshall Project found that the high costs of cap­i­tal cas­es pre­vent some dis­trict attor­neys from seek­ing the death penal­ty.​“You have to be very respon­si­ble in select­ing where you want to spend your mon­ey,” said Stephen Taylor, a pros­e­cu­tor in Liberty County,…

On December 18, DPIC released its annu­al report on the lat­est devel­op­ments in cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment,​“The Death Penalty in 2014: Year End Report.” In 2014, 35 peo­ple were exe­cut­ed, the fewest in 20 years. Death sen­tences dropped to their low­est lev­el in the mod­ern era of the death penal­ty, with 72 peo­ple sen­tenced to death, the small­est num­ber in 40 years. Just sev­en states car­ried out exe­cu­tions, and three states (Texas,…

In a series of arti­cles ana­lyz­ing Pennsylvania’s death penal­ty, the Reading Eagle found that tax­pay­ers have spent over $350 mil­lion on the death penal­ty over a peri­od in which the state has car­ried out just three exe­cu­tions, all of inmates who dropped their appeals. Using data from a Maryland cost study, which con­clud­ed that death penal­ty cas­es cost $1.9 mil­lion more than sim­i­lar cas­es in which the death penal­ty was not…

On December 11 District Judge Darlene Byrne ruled that the source of Texas’ lethal injec­tion drugs is a mat­ter of pub­lic record, and the state should release the infor­ma­tion. Texas has been obtain­ing pen­to­bar­bi­tal from an unnamed com­pound­ing phar­ma­cy. The deci­sion result­ed from a suit filed ear­li­er this year on behalf of death row inmates, two of whom have since been exe­cut­ed. Texas had been open about the source of its exe­cu­tion drugs until May, when…

Attorneys for sev­er­al inmates in Oklahoma have asked a fed­er­al court to stay their exe­cu­tions and pre­sent­ed new accounts of the botched exe­cu­tion of Clayton Lockett (pic­tured) as evi­dence the state’s exe­cu­tion pro­ce­dure is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly cru­el. The recent fil­ing includ­ed state­ments describ­ing the exe­cu­tion from the war­den, an attend­ing para­medic, and a vic­tims’ ser­vices advo­cate who witnessed…